


The Last Ride

by VictoriaCroft



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: BBC canon, F/M, M/M, sherlock season 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-20
Updated: 2014-01-20
Packaged: 2018-01-09 08:33:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1143830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VictoriaCroft/pseuds/VictoriaCroft
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by Season 3 Episode 3. Before Sherlock left for Eastern Europe, what if he had said to John just what everyone wanted him to say? Close to BBC canon with deeper analysis of motives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Ride

**Author's Note:**

> My first Sherlock fic. No copyright infringement is intended (direct quotes are included, tho) and no money received. I’m just taking Moffat’s & Gatiss’ words out for a short walk in the park. I’ll bring them back unharmed and in time for dinner.

“Oh Sherlock, what have you done?”  
\-----------------------  
Sherlock Holmes alighted from the limo at the RAF airfield at Northolt Jet Centre. The day was clear and chilly, and the sun gleamed down in a way that it almost never does in North London. “Typical”, thought Sherlock, during the short trip from Baker Street, “I’m about to get myself killed for England and we finally have decent weather. I should jump out at the next light, strip off and run naked down the A40.” Mycroft had traveled with him but both brothers had been silent for most of the trip; this had been hastily arranged and everything already said. There were arguments, recriminations, even some clever bargaining but there was nothing for it. Sherlock Holmes had shot and killed Charles Augustus Magnusson, hardly in cold blood if you recall the circumstances, but those could never be revealed. At least, not sufficiently to exonerate Sherlock.

The only alternative to prison – where he would almost certainly be killed – was to send him to Eastern Europe on the MI6 case, where he would almost certainly be killed. Sherlock looked up with resignation at the shiny white Gulfstream G450 that would take him off to the dangerous case Mycroft had wished his brother to decline at Christmas. Now, there was nowhere else for Sherlock to go.

The brothers stood silently side by side on the tarmac when the second limo pulled up and John Watson stepped out. Sherlock started to walk toward him when a familiar red jacket slid along the seat of the car and Mary Watson stepped out. “Hmm, probably not the best time for your wife to be here”, thought Sherlock, but he said nothing of course, only giving Mary a warm hug and admonishing her to look after her husband and baby. Mary had an unknown, brutal past and shot her husband’s best friend, but John had ultimately forgiven her and intended to make a new life. Now that he was leaving, perhaps for good, Sherlock wanted only the best for John and was quite happy for him, but yet…

“Since this is likely to be the last conversation I’ll have with John Watson,” asked Sherlock of his brother, “would you mind if we took a moment?” Mycroft nodded and walked off with Mary, sociably explaining to her why it was that they were able to use the private military airfield for Sherlock’s sendoff. If Mary knew more about Northolt than her erstwhile tour guide, neither of them mentioned it.

Several yards from the Gulfstream’s stairs, and far enough from Mycroft’s earshot, Sherlock stopped and turned to John. “William Sherlock Scott Holmes. That’s the whole of it if you’re looking for baby names.” John registered a moment’s surprise at his friend’s full name and then laughed at the reference to the Irene Adler case. “We’ve done the scan, it’s a girl.” Sherlock smiled and made a silly joke about the name he had opted to call himself by. A baby. A _baby_. Sherlock could hardly believe how much his life had changed. Wait, he thought. No. This was John Watson’s life. Stop making everything about yourself. Sherlock’s face turned serious and he looked down as he spoke.

“John, there’s something I should say. I’ve meant to say it always and I never have. Since it’s unlikely we’ll ever meet again, I might as well say it now.”

John Watson looked up at Sherlock with the same curious, expectant expression he had always worn when his former flatmate enumerated his impossible deductions, solving yet another case. He anticipated a lengthy discourse on their successful partnership, ending with one last apology for his previous long absence and the one to come. Their parting, too soon after Sherlock’s return was painful, even heartbreaking, but he bore up knowing Sherlock’s next exile would be worse. How long, Watson wondered, would it last this time?

Looking into John’s eyes, nearly straight through him, Sherlock’s face went through several emotions, few of which Watson had ever seen on the familiar face before him. The shooting and torture in Siberia had taken its toll, John thought, but Sherlock was still one of the most handsome men he had ever seen.

Sherlock seemed to be having trouble deciding what to say, or even to say anything at all. John smiled helpfully. Sherlock took a deep breath…

“I love you, John Watson.”

Sherlock seemed to be about to continue, but stopped. What else could he possibly say to the somewhat puzzled man before him that would be adequate? He owed John so much, more than could ever be explained by simple words. In the two years he had been gone, John had been totally out of his life and Sherlock had sometimes despaired of being away from his presence. Camped out in one godawful safehouse after another in Irkutsk or Bangkok or Beghazi, dug in from dawn to dark until he could safely move around again, Sherlock would occasionally find his brain and body insisting on the slumber he always refused himself. Closing his eyes for a few fitful hours of sleep, he would see John’s face behind his eyelids, as vivid as if he were there in the room. Eventually, Sherlock began to understand what he had almost certainly felt the moment Mike Stamford had brought John to St. Bart’s as a potential flatmate.

Two years later, he realized that nearly everyone he knew, from Lestrade to Mrs. Hudson, had known what he himself hadn’t: that he loved John Watson dearly and deeply. Now that John had moved on with Mary, there was almost a feeling of sympathy from his friends for Sherlock. He had returned but, thinking him dead, the lover he hoped for had not waited for him and Sherlock bristled at the sympathy. The new emotions Sherlock had discovered in himself, and what they really meant, now left him impatient, frustrated but worst of all, confused. Leaving now by force and perhaps never to see John again, he must clear his mind and tell John what was going on in his head, now that he finally knew. Mary Watson be damned -- she could consider this a small payback for the bullet she had fired into his body, even if it had been done to save his life.

“No, John, it’s more than what I said at the reception. It’s taken me too long to learn what I should have known from the beginning. If I could take back those two years, if I could have spent them with you, maybe things would have been different. We’ll never know, but I need you to finally understand this, understand me. It’s the only way I can leave you again. I…love you.” Tears welled in his eyes and threatened to fall, but Mycroft’s and Mary’s proximity held Sherlock back from giving voice to the sudden sob in his throat.

From the plane's steps, Mycroft cleared his throat to shake loose this unnecessarily long goodbye and get his brother safely away. John and Sherlock, however, were miles deep in each other’s eyes, wordless, both astounded at what has just transpired. A brief thought flashed through Sherlock’s mind: Is John going to slug me again? He took a deep breath, blinked and started to walk toward the plane, when he heard his name:

“Sherlock.”

John’s voice was soft, nearly at a whisper and Sherlock turned quickly at the unsettling tone of it. His face showed what he had no right to hope, but desperately did and he stood rooted to the tarmac, wanting to move toward John but completely unable to. Instead, John took the step to close the gap and smiled slightly, huffing a short, one-note laugh.

For the first time since the wedding reception, John wrapped his arms around Sherlock and held him tight. For the first time since he was a small boy, Sherlock embraced someone with love, not caring what anyone else thought or might say. He gasped with the power of it, and held John as though there were nowhere else to go, nothing else to do but this, for the rest of their lives.

John pulled back, still holding on, “I know, Sherlock. I know. I’ve always known. But what could I have done? It wasn’t in me and I simply couldn’t change myself. I tried, for both of us, but I could never make myself someone I’m not. Then I thought you were dead, and I was just lost for so long.” He paused. “If I hadn’t met Mary, I don’t know what you and I would have been, but don’t hate her for it. She liked you the minute she met you. Well, after I hit you a couple of times.” Sherlock smiled slowly; this wasn’t about Mary but yet, it was.

Somewhere in the distance, another Holmes rolled his eyes at the delay, sighed and turned to give the door of the Gulfstream a good examination. He would never understand his brother as long as he lived, but he’d had an idea about this since the time he abducted John Watson from the Brixton streets five years ago to interrogate him about his intentions. Sherlock needed protecting, and this Afghan veteran with PTSD was not the one to be joining forces with his erratic sociopath of a brother. Almost immediately, though, he saw that something else was going on. If John had been a different man, Mycroft thought, there might indeed have been a happy announcement and Sherlock might have been less impulsive, less dramatic, less trouble. Mycroft smiled ruefully at the plane, at his brother, at the world.

Mary, however, watched without flinching. Both before and since Sherlock’s return, John had frequently spoken of his association with Sherlock. His stories were filled with admiration, respect, exasperation and love. She wondered sometimes if things had ever progressed further but, as her husband explained, her past was none of his business; now his past was none of hers. She would take her husband back home, to wait for their child and settle down as best they could, but Sherlock would always be part of their lives.

The tears in Sherlock’s eyes finally ran down his face and he turned from John’s embrace to wipe his eyes with the back of his hand. Then he turned back and offered his hand. “To the very best of times, John.” John took his hand and smiled. It was done; the last five minutes would be sealed in time, like a fly in ancient amber, and never spoken of again. Sherlock strode toward the Gulfstream and John followed. He looked at Mary, briefly at Mycroft, and climbed up the stairs to his fate.

\----------------------

“It’s your brother”, the steward said as he handed Sherlock the phone.  
“Hello, little brother.”  
“I’ve only been gone four minutes!”  
“Then I hope you’ve learned your lesson. Turns out you’re needed again.”  
“Oh, for god’s sake, make up your mind. Who needs me this time?”  
“England.”

While Mycroft explained what was now required of his brother, the pilot received his orders from the tower, then banked sharply and turned the small plane back to Northolt. As they approached the runway, Mary’s heart fell and John’s jumped. Things would indeed never be the same.


End file.
